As a visitor to Sri Lanka you are met by the light. It’s the sun, the smiles and the often overwhelmingly bright light in many people’s eyes.

It is not only the beautiful and amazingly long sandy beaches, the tropical lushness of the rainforests or the green, sometimes cloud covered hills that make up the interior of the country that have made many visitor exclaim in praise, also the people of this island nation very much contributes in making this country an amazingly beautiful place – the pearl of the Indian ocean.

Many seriously claim it to be the place where Eden once was.

Of the country’s population about 70% are Buddhists, 15% are Hindus and the rest are approximately equal part Christians and Muslims.

The Buddhism has obviously put its mark on the literature, art and architecture of this country. But its different then the one you’ll find in other countries in eastern or northern Asia. It is according to many witnesses more colourful and mystic, with many Hindu influences.

In practice many people in Sri Lanka mixes different aspects from different religions together into their own personal belief and ritual. For example it’s normal for a Christian or a Buddhist to pray or offer alms to a Hindu god for a specific reason. All religions also use some cult places in common, especially Adams Peak and Kataragama.

Sri Lanka has a tropical climate with an average temperature of 28 C on the coast and 20 C in the interior. There are two monsoons passing the country creating different dry and wet seasons. One is the Yala, which passes over the southwest coast and the country’s central parts, bring rain mainly to the south from May till August. The other is the Maha which pass the northeast coast bringing rain mainly to the north from October till January.

The ocean keeps an average temperature of 27 C the year around and you should know that it can rain even during the dry seasons but rain seldom last for any longer period of time and it mostly falls during the nights.